Of Things to Come
by midnightjen
Summary: Riley's first day as a Scooby doesn't go exactly as planned when he gets a glimpse of things to come.


Disclaimer:- Buffy does not belong to me

A/N:- this is my first Buffy fic, takes place in S4 just before and during Doomed and an AU S6 just before Riley comes back.

He was excited, he knew it, a little too excited really, he knew that too. Its just he was going to meet Buffy's friends and this time there wouldn't be the awkwardness of either him or the Scooby's trying to run off and save the day while not letting on that's what they were doing. Now he knew that Buffy was the Slayer and that for the last three and a half years she and her friends had been protecting Sunnydale from the things that go bump in the night. He was eager to meet the group that had managed to protect Sunnydale by themselves more effectively than the initiative ever did.

The closer he got to Giles' apartment the more he began to feel like a bit of an idiot for being so excited and by the time he was standing at the front door fist raised to knock he'd managed to calm himself down. His first knock went unnoticed and when he strained his ears for the sound of somebody being home he could make out raised voices. Knocking a little louder it was Giles that answered the door. He greeted Riley with a tired smile and beckoned him in.

Once inside it became evident where the raised voices were coming from and if the tired and weary looks on the other's faces were anything to go by, also the source of Giles look. Buffy stood in the middle of the little living room arms waving about animatedly and arguing with a bleached blond man who was simply regarding her with a smirk. The man looked familiar but Riley couldn't place where he had seen him before.

'Rupert Giles,' Giles introduced offering Riley his hand and ignoring the arguing slayer and man. 'I'm very interested in what you do for the initiative.'

'Riley Finn.'

Riley took the offered hand but his eyes kept flicking back to Buffy. He couldn't tell what they were arguing about but words like "chip", "demons" and "stake" were getting thrown around a lot. Following his line of sight Giles heaved an exasperated sigh and motioned to the others settled around the room. Willow was on the couch with Anya; both were watching Buffy and the man like a tennis match. While Willow seemed annoyed, Anya, more than anything, appeared amused. Xander was slumped in a chair beside the couch a cushion over his head as if he could block out the display before him.

'Perhaps it's a good thing you arrived when you did.'

Riley moved closer to the group planning to interrupt when some of what Buffy was saying filtered through.

'…engaged!'

'Bloody hell, Slayer, it was a spell. Not like I could do anything about it.'

Buffy scoffed.

'Admit it slayer, the thing that's got your little panties in a twist isn't that we were under a spell it's that you liked it.'

They certainly had everyone's attention now. Through the conversation Riley had come to realize that this must be Spike, the man Buffy said she was engaged to that one time. By the sounds of things it was the result of a spell, if you believed in such things. Xander was looking over the top of his cushion with a rather disgusted look on his face. Buffy was muttering threats under her breath which Spike seemed to hear and had him grinning amusedly. Buffy took a threatening step toward Spike.

'Chip or no chip I am going to kill you Spike.'

Spike snorted.

'You couldn't kill me, Slayer, even if I got this chip out of my head and slaughtered half of Sunnyhell.'

'Oh, I could kill you Spike, it would be really…' Buffy trailed off and frowned.

Suddenly there was a flash of green light and everyone was reaching up to shield their eyes. When the light faded away Buffy and Spike were arguing again only this time something was different.

'What's wrong with William?' Buffy demanded crossing her arms and glaring at Spike.

'William was a love sick ponce.'

'But he's _my_ love sick ponce.'

'Hey!' Spike growled. 'Take that back.'

'Make me!' Buffy replied with a cheeky smile.

Spike smirked at her and stepped away causing her to frown. Suddenly her face lit up and she grinned.

'Isabella!'

Spike smiled and stepped back to Buffy wrapping an arm around her and tugging her up against him. He opened his mouth to say something and then his eyes focused on something behind her and widened. Frowning Buffy turned to see what he was looking at and found herself looking at the stunned and disturbed faces of her friends and Riley.

'What happened? How did we get here?' Buffy asked warily.

'Buffy?' Giles questioned. 'What are you talking about?'

'When did you get back?'

'Back? I assure you, Buffy, I never left.'

'Uh, Buffy,' Spike said hesitantly.

'You left and now your back.'

'Luv, look around.'

'What? Oh.'

Riley frowned; he could honestly say that he had no idea what had just happened. Nor it seemed did anyone else.

'Buffy, why are you, with the Spike closeness?' Willow questioned.

'Oh this is bad,' Buffy moaned. 'This isn't supposed to happen. How did this happen?'

'Buffy, maybe if you tell us what you believe to be the problem we could help.'

'Time, watcher, we seem to have gone back.'

'We were arguing about names in Spike's crypt and then poof here were are thrown back to the time of Giles' apartment and Giles with the still being here.'

'Could be a spell,' Spike suggested. 'Red been messing with things she don't understand again?'

'No she's been really good, Tara's been helping her.'

'Tara?' Willow squeaked. 'You know about Tara?'

'Course we do.'

'B-but how?'

'You gotta be kidding me?' Spike turned back to Buffy. 'We get thrown back to the time of Soldier Boy and Red's stepping out of the closet?'

'You believe you have gone back in time.'

'Either that or this is some sort of spell where I am forced to relive the worst decision of my dating life,' Buffy huffed.

Spike grinned at her. 'Thought I held that spot, luv.'

'You with the good sex and the awesome sex? Sad but you've become the best decision of my dating life.'

'Thanks, luv.'

Riley was hurt and confused and disgusted and he wanted answers much like everyone else in the room. Unlike everyone else in the room his girlfriend was spouting off about him being a bad dating choice and having awesome sex with Spike. Riley chanced a glance at her friends and saw that Xander had turned an interesting shade of green, Willow was bright red and Anya looked like finally things were getting interesting.

'Buffy I suggest you and Spike sit down and explain to us again, and in English, what has happened and we in turn can tell you what we know.'

'Okay.'

Buffy nodded and took a seat on the other couch beside Spike.

'Tell us what you know,' Buffy said waving her hand as if to make him hurry.

'You and Spike were arguing about Willow's Will Be Done spell and then there was a flash of green light and you were arguing about someone named William.'

'That's it? No one did any spells? Made any wishes?'

'Not that I am aware of,' Giles assured her. 'Perhaps if you were to tell us more of what you remember we could discern whose side this, err, time travel occurred on.'

'Spike and I were on patrol-'

'In the future?' Xander asked.

'2002,' Buffy supplied. 'Anyway we were patrolling and it was ridiculously quiet so we went back to his crypt and we got to talking and then we got to arguing and then bam here we are in…'

'2000,' Willow specified.

'Why did you not just go home?'

'Uh, it was still early.'

'And what were you and Spike talking about? Perhaps one of you inadvertently did this.'

Buffy shot Spike a nervous look that didn't go unnoticed by anyone in the room.

'Buffy if there is something you are not telling is, something that may be of importance in finding out what has happened you need to tell us.'

'We were discussing baby names,' Buffy whispered.

She winced as soon as she'd said it and waited for the fallout. She wasn't disappointed; there was an explosion of noise everyone asking the same questions at different volumes. Why were they discussing baby names? Was she pregnant? Why was she talking about it to Spike?

'Will you shut up?' Spike yelled, successfully silencing everyone.

'It's not important, just trust me we are not responsible for this.'

'Cecily!' Spike announced suddenly.

'What?' Riley sputtered, he was having trouble coming to terms with this and was feeling a little put out that no one else was having trouble with the whole going back in time aspect of things just the Buffy and Spike aspect.

'Cecily as in you're beneath me Cecily?' Buffy said confused.

'No, well yes, but Cecily now a vengeance demon named Halfrek, Cecily.'

'She was Cecily?' Buffy glared at something only she could see. 'Should have killed that bitch.'

'You think Hallie did this?' Anya frowned.

'Her thing is children, right? So she's got her in to get us back.'

'You think she used our unborn child as a way to get revenge on us?' Buffy asked incredulously.

'Your what?' Riley yelped in a highly unmanly manner.

'Look I'm pregnant okay? Can we get over that and find a way to get us back before Dawn does something stupid.'

'Who is Dawn?'

'Not the time, Giles.'

Before Giles got a chance to say anything more Spike was on his feet and shouting angrily into the air.

'Halfrek! Get your ass here right now! Halfrek!'

With a dramatic flourish and a bit of smoke for show Halfrek appeared in the apartment. Riley gave a start and took a giant step back from the veiny, wrinkly demon that had just appeared.

'What do you want, William?'

'You did this!'

'Me? I didn't do anything?'

'You knew who I was and that tells me you exist outside of this timeline and that tells me you knew about this so send us back bitch before I really do kill you,' Spike snarled.

'Temper, temper, William.'

'Why'd you do it, Cecily?'

Buffy wasn't interested in talking she threw herself at Halfrek; Halfrek shoved Buffy aside roughly knocking her in to Riley who had stepped forward to help. He fell back and cracked his head against the table. The last thing he saw before everything went black was a very angry Spike launching himself at Halfrek.

'Riley. Riley.'

Riley groaned. Someone was calling his name and shaking him gently. He opened his eyes and groaned at the light above him.

'Ugh,' he moaned pushing himself up.

He was lying on the couch, Buffy and her friends were crouched around him. Buffy helped him to sit up and Willow handed him a glass of water. He took it gratefully.

'What happened?'

'Bitch got you real good,' Spike snorted.

'Huh?'

'Demon girl grants wishes, knocked you flat,' Buffy explained.

'Oh.'

Riley frowned but as conversation started up around him things seemed to be perfectly normal. Shaking his head and thinking he must have hit his head fairly hard he fell back in to the conversation around him. The Scooby's were talking about the latest big bad as they called it, a group of demons planning on ending the world. They sat around and planned what they were going to do and then they got up to go their separate ways. Buffy took Riley's hand and saying goodbye led him out of the apartment. Just as they were closing the door Riley heard Anya chirpily tell Xander:

'I hope in the future we're just as happy as Buffy and Spike.'


End file.
